Good-Bye, Mr. Chips Quotes

“What a host of little incidents, all deep-buried in the past -- problems that had once been urgent, arguments that had once been keen, anecdotes that were funny only because one remembered the fun. Did any emotion really matter when the last trace of it had vanished from human memory; and if that were so, what a crowd of emotions clung to him as to their last home before annihilation? He must be kind to them, must treasure them in his mind before their long sleep.”
― James Hilton, Good-Bye, Mr. Chips

“When you are getting on in years it is nice to sit by the fire and drink a cup of tea and listen to the school bell sounding dinner, call-over, prep., and lights out. Chips always wound up the clock after that last bell; then he put the wire guard in front of the fire, turned out the gas, and carried a detective novel to bed. Rarely did he read more than a page of it before sleep came swiftly and peacefully, more like a mystic intensifying of perception than any changeful entrance into another world. For his days and nights were equally full of dreaming.”
― James Hilton, Good-Bye, Mr. Chips

“Where had they all gone to, he often pondered; those threads he had once held together, how far had they scattered, some to break, others to weave into unknown patterns? The strange randomness of the world beguiled him, that randomness which never would, so long as the world lasted, give meaning to those choruses again.”
― James Hilton, Good-Bye, Mr. Chips

“Brookfield will never forget his lovableness," said Cartwright, in a speech to the School. Which was absurd, because all things are forgotten in the end.”
― James Hilton, Good-Bye, Mr. Chips

“I thought I heard you—one of you—saying it was a pity—umph—a pity I never had—any children … eh? … But I have, you know … I have …” The others smiled without answering, and after a pause Chips began a faint and palpitating chuckle. “Yes—umph—I have,” he added, with quavering merriment. “Thousands of ’em … thousands of ’em… and all boys.”
― James Hilton, Goodbye, Mr. Chips

“You cannot judge the importance of things by the noise they make.”
― James Hilton, Good-Bye, Mr. Chips

“And so it stood, a warm and vivid patch in his life, casting a radiance that glowed in a thousand recollections.”
― James Hilton, Good-Bye, Mr. Chips

“For Chips, like some old sea captain, still measured time by the signals of the past. . . .”
― James Hilton, Good-Bye, Mr. Chips

“He had, in fact, already begun to sink into that creeping dry rot of pedagogy which is the worst and ultimate pitfall of the profession; giving the same lessons year after year had formed a groove into which the other affairs of his life adjusted themselves with insidious ease. He worked well; he was conscientious; he was a fixture that gave service, satisfaction, confidence, everything except inspiration.”
― James Hilton, Good-Bye, Mr. Chips

“His guests found it fun to watch him make tea -- mixing careful spoonfuls from different caddies.”
― James Hilton, Good-Bye, Mr. Chips

“those ideas of dignity and generosity that were becoming increasingly rare in a frantic world.”
― James Hilton, Goodbye, Mr. Chips!

“When you grow older you miss that eagerness; life may be happy, you may have health and wealth and love and success, but the odds are that you never look forward as you once did to a single golden day. You never count the hours to it, you never see some moment ahead beckoning like a goddess across a fourth dimension.”
― James Hilton, Good-Bye, Mr. Chips

“And sometimes, when the bell rang for call-over, he would go to the window and look across the road and over the School fence and see, in the distance, the thin line of boys filing past the bench. New times, new names . . . but the old ones still remained . . . Jefferson, Jennings, Jolyon, Jupp, Kingsley Primus, Kingsley Secundus, Kingsley Tertius, Kingston . . . where are you all, where have you all gone to?”
― James Hilton, Good-Bye, Mr. Chips

“For he did not, he would have said, care for women; he never felt at home or at ease with them; and that monstrous creature beginning to be talked about, the New Woman of the nineties, filled him with horror. He was a quiet, conventional person, and the world, viewed from the haven of Brookfield, seemed to him full of distasteful innovations; there was a fellow named Bernard Shaw who had the strangest and most reprehensible opinions; there was Ibsen, too, with his disturbing plays; and there was this new craze for bicycles which was being taken up by women equally with men. Chips did not hold with all this modern newness and freedom. He had a vague notion, if he ever formulated it, that nice women were weak, timid, and delicate, and that nice men treated them with a polite but rather distant chivalry.”
― James Hilton, Good-Bye, Mr. Chips

“but chiefly I remember all your faces. I never forget them. I have thousands of faces in my mind—the faces of boys. If you come and see me again in years to come—as I hope you all will—I shall try to remember those older faces of yours, but it's just possible I shan't be able to—and then some day you'll see me somewhere and I shan't recognize you and you'll say to yourself, 'The old boy doesn't remember me.' [Laughter] But I DO remember you—as you are NOW. That's the point. In my mind you never grow up at all.”
― James Hilton, Goodbye, Mr. Chips!

“He was forty-eight — an age at which permanence of habits begins to be predictable.”
― James Hilton, Good-Bye, Mr. Chips

“On the night before the wedding, when Chips left the house to return to his hotel, she said, with mock gravity: "This is an occasion, you know--this last farewell of ours. I feel rather like a new boy beginning his first term with you. Not scared, mind you--but just, for once, in a thoroughly respectful mood. Shall I call you 'sir'--or would 'Mr. Chips' be the right thing? 'Mr. Chips,' I think. Good-bye, then--good-bye, Mr. Chips. . . .”
― James Hilton, Good-Bye, Mr. Chips

“I remember Mrs. Brool, whose photograph is still in the tuckshop; she served there until an uncle in Australia left her a lot of money. In fact, I remember so much that I often think I ought to write a book. Now what should I call it? 'Memories of Rod and Lines'--eh? [Cheers and laughter. That was a good one, people thought--one of Chips's best.] Well, well, perhaps I shall write it, some day. But I'd rather tell you about it, really. I remember . . . I remember . . . but chiefly I remember all your faces. I never forget them. I have thousands of faces in my mind--the faces of boys. If you come and see me again in years to come--as I hope you all will--I shall try to remember those older faces of yours, but it's just possible I shan't be able to--and then some day you'll see me somewhere and I shan't recognize you and you'll say to yourself, 'The old boy doesn't remember me.' [Laughter] But I do remember you--as you are now. That's the point. In my mind you never grow up at all. Never. Sometimes, for instance, when people talk to me about our respected Chairman of the Governors, I think to myself, 'Ah, yes, a jolly little chap with hair that sticks up on top--and absolutely no idea whatever about the difference between a Gerund and a Gerundive.' [Loud laughter]”
― James Hilton, Good-Bye, Mr. Chips

“These examinations and certificates and so on--what did they matter? And all this efficiency and up-to-dateness--what did that matter, either? Ralston was trying to run Brookfield like a factory--a factory for turning out a snob culture based on money and machines. The old gentlemanly traditions of family and broad acres were changing, as doubtless they were bound to; but instead of widening them to form a genuine inclusive democracy of duke and dustman, Ralston was narrowing them upon the single issue of a fat banking account. There never had been so many rich men's sons at Brookfield. The Speech Day Garden Party was like Ascot. Ralston met these wealthy fellows in London clubs and persuaded them that Brookfield was the coming school, and, since they couldn't buy their way into Eton or Harrow, they greedily swallowed the bait. Awful fellows, some of them--though others were decent enough. Financiers, company promoters, pill manufacturers. One of them gave his son five pounds a week pocket money. Vulgar . . . ostentatious . . . all the hectic rotten-ripeness of the age. . . . And once Chips had got into trouble because of some joke he had made about the name and ancestry of a boy named Isaacstein. The boy wrote home about it, and Isaacstein père sent an angry letter to Ralston. Touchy, no sense of humor, no sense of proportion--that was the matter with them, these new fellows. . . . No sense of proportion. And it was a sense of proportion, above all things, that Brookfield ought to teach--not so much Latin or Greek or Chemistry or Mechanics. And you couldn't expect to test that sense of proportion by setting papers and granting certificates...”
― James Hilton, Good-Bye, Mr. Chips

“Those who knew him will be sorry to hear that he was killed last week, on the Western Front." He was a little pale when he sat down afterward, aware that he had done something unusual. He had consulted nobody about it, anyhow; no one else could be blamed. Later, outside the Chapel, he heard an argument:— "On the Western Front, Chips said. Does that mean he was fighting for the Germans?" "I suppose it does." "Seems funny, then, to read his name out with all the others. After all, he was an ENEMY." "Oh, just one of Chips's ideas, I expect. The old boy still has 'em.”
― James Hilton, Goodbye, Mr. Chips!

“Touchy, no sense of humor, no sense of proportion—that was the matter with them, these new fellows... No sense of proportion. And it was a sense of proportion, above all things, that Brookfield ought to teach”
― James Hilton, Goodbye, Mr. Chips!

“that he was both more and less experienced than the youngest new boy at the School might well be; and that, that paradox of age and youth, was what the world called progress.”
― James Hilton, Goodbye, Mr. Chips

“For the first time in his life he felt necessary—and necessary to something that was nearest his heart. There is no sublimer feeling in the world, and it was his at last.”
― James Hilton, Goodbye, Mr. Chips

“If you come and see me again in years to come—as I hope you all will—I shall try to remember those older faces of yours, but it’s just possible I shan’t be able to—and then some day you’ll see me somewhere and I shan’t recognize you and you’ll say to yourself, ‘The old boy doesn’t remember me.’ [Laughter] But I do remember you—as you are now. That’s the point. In my mind you never grow up at all.”
― James Hilton, Good-Bye, Mr. Chips

“por encima de todo, las campanas de Brookfield, las campanas de Brookfield.”
― James Hilton, Adiós, señor Chips

“All things are forgotten in the end”
― James Hilton, Good-bye, Mr. Chips

“I thought I heard you—one of you—saying it was a pity —umph—a pity I never had—any children... eh?... But I have, you know... I have..." The others smiled without answering, and after a pause Chips began a faint and palpitating chuckle. "Yes—umph—I have," he added, with quavering merriment. "Thousands of 'em... thousands of 'em... and all boys.”
― James Hilton, Goodbye, Mr. Chips!

“He felt that it would not be fair to hang on if he could not decently do his job. Besides, he would not sever himself completely. He would take rooms across the road, with the excellent Mrs. Wickett who had once been linen-room maid; he could visit the School whenever he wanted, and could still, in a sense, remain a part of it.”
― James Hilton, Goodbye, Mr. Chips!

“These examinations and certificates and so on —what did they matter? And all this efficiency and up-to-dateness —what did THAT matter, either? Ralston was trying to run Brookfield like a factory—a factory for turning out a snob culture based on money and machines. The old gentlemanly traditions of family and broad acres were changing, as doubtless they were bound to; but instead of widening them to form a genuine inclusive democracy of duke and dustman, Ralston was narrowing them upon the single issue of a fat banking account. There never had been so many rich men's sons at Brookfield. The Speech Day Garden Party was like Ascot.”
― James Hilton, Goodbye, Mr. Chips!

“In politics she was a radical, with leanings toward the views of people like Bernard Shaw and William Morris. All her ideas and opinions she poured out to Chips during those summer afternoons at Wasdale Head; and he, because he was not very articulate, did not at first think it worth while to contradict them. Her friend went away, but she stayed; what COULD you do with such a person, Chips thought. He used to hobble with sticks along a footpath leading to the tiny church; there was a stone slab on the wall, and it was comfortable to sit down, facing the sunlight and the green-brown majesty of the Gable and listening to the chatter of—well, yes, Chips had to admit it— a very beautiful girl.”
― James Hilton, Goodbye, Mr. Chips!